The present invention relates to a nanocarrier for targeted therapy and/or diagnosis of a prostate cancer cell, the nanocarrier including a micelle including a phosphate surfactant represented by a specific Chemical Formula. The micelle including the phosphate surfactant constituting the nanocarrier for targeted therapy and/or diagnosis of the prostate cancer cell according to the present invention is cleaved by the overexpressed enzyme in the vicinity of the prostate cancer cell, so that therapeutic agent or diagnostic agent particles loaded on the micelle are capable of being selectively released to the prostate cancer cell. Therefore, it is possible to maximize the therapeutic and/or diagnostic effects while remarkably reducing the side effects of the drug in the living body compared to a conventional technology.

Provided is a preparation method of near-infrared silver sulfide quantum dots. The silver sulfide quantum dots have hydrophilic groups derived from a mercapto-containing hydrophilic reagent attached on the surface thereof, and the hydrophilic reagent is any one of mercaptoacetic acid, mercaptopropionic acid, cysteine, cysteamine, thioctic acid and ammonium mercaptoacetate or any combination thereof. The silver sulfide quantum dots have high fluorescence yield, good fluorescence stability, good biocompatibility and uniform sizes. The preparation method has moderate reaction conditions, simple operation, short production cycle, good reproducibility and is easy to control. The silver sulfide quantum dots can be used in the application of cellular imaging and biological tissue imaging.

Described herein are novel conjugates containing an inhibitor (e.g., a PSMA inhibitor, e.g., a gastrin-releasing peptide receptor inhibitor) and metal chelator that are covalently attached to a macromolecule (e.g., a nanoparticle, a polymer, a protein). Such conjugates exhibit distinct properties over the free, unbound inhibitor/chelator construct.

Nanoparticles include a core, a hydrophilic layer around the core, and one or more mitochondrial targeting moieties, and may optionally include one or more contrast agents or one or more therapeutic agents. For effective mitochondrial targeting the nanoparticles have a diameter of about 200 nm or less or have a zeta potential of about 0 mV or more.

The present invention relates to nanoscale polymer dots (Pdots) that include strongly light absorbing semiconducting polymer nanoparticles doped with near-IR emitting dyes. The polymer functions as an antenna and transfers the excitation energy to the doped near-IR emitting dye molecules, which function as the emitting entity. The resulting Pdots feature very bright near-IR emission with emission wavelength tunability, high water solubility, and stability in biological solutions.

A method for early stage pathology detection, location, imaging, evaluation, and treatment of cells and/or extracellular vesicles in the circulation.

Quantum converting nanoparticles for electric field sensing are provided. In one example, by combining upconverting lanthanide ions with voltage responsive dyes, we generate an optical platform that displays intensity and spectrum changes in the presence of electric fields. Our particles enable local (down to 10 nm spatial resolution) mapping of electric fields with exceptional photostability. We can image and quantify in vivo and in situ electric fields in biological and material systems up to fields of 100 kV/cm.

Provided herein are transmitter ligands that improve photon upconversion of near infrared light (NIR) to visible light. The presently provided ligands are complexed to semiconductor nanocrystals and improve triplet energy transfer from semiconductor nanocrystal to annihilator in triplet-triplet annihilation. Suitable applications include bio-imaging.

A new nanoparticle (NP)-based, multicomponent delivery/reporter construct can mediate the controlled, spatiotemporal, active release of an appended cargo to the cytosol of mammalian cells. The construct comprises components including (1) a central NP scaffold, for example a photoluminescent quantum dot (QD); (2) a bridging structure that self-assembles to the NP surface (for example, histidine-tagged maltose binding protein); and (3) a cargo, for example a ligand-dye/drug conjugate, incorporating a ligand that allows the cargo to releasably bind to the bridging structure (e.g., a -cyclodextrin ligand for binding to maltose binding protein).

Disclosed are cell membrane-derived nanovesicles, a method of preparing the nanovesicles, and a pharmaceutical composition and a diagnostic kit using the nanovesicles. The cell membrane-derived nanovesicles may prevent potential adverse effects because intracellular materials (e.g., genetic materials and cytosolic proteins) unnecessary for delivering therapeutic or diagnostic substances are removed from the nanovesicles. In addition, as the nanovesicles may be targeted to specific cells or tissues, therapeutic or diagnostic substances may be predominantly delivered to the targeted cells or tissues, while delivery of the substances may be inhibited. Therefore, the nanovesicles may alleviate suffering and inconvenience of patients by reducing adverse effects of therapeutic substances and by improving efficacy of the substances. In addition, the cell membrane-derived nanovesicles loaded with therapeutic or diagnostic substances and a method of preparing the nanovesicles may be used in vitro or in vivo for therapeutic or diagnostic purposes, or for experimental use.